Apple removes 25,000 illegal gambling apps in China
Company responds to pressure from Chinese state media
Online giant Apple has reportedly removed as many as 25,000 “illegal” gambling apps from the Chinese version of its app store.
It follows criticism from China’s state operated broadcaster China Central Television (CCTV), which called on Apple to do more to filter out banned materials from its software.
Earlier this month, the network aired a 30-minute special report slamming Apple for allegedly allowing illegal gambling apps on its platforms. In its report, CCTV said “Apple itself has set up the rules on how to allow apps onto its store, but it didn’t follow them.”
In a statement to the Wall Street Journal, the tech giant said: “Gambling apps are illegal and not allowed on App Store in China.
“We have already removed many apps and developers for trying to distribute illegal gambling apps on our App Store, and we are vigilant in our efforts to find these and stop them from being on App Store.”
Apple currently operates over 1.8m apps on the Chinese App Store, according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and began a crackdown on illegal gambling related apps earlier this month.
In an email to the affected developers, Apple said: “In order to reduce fraudulent activity on App Store and comply with government requests to address illegal online gambling activity, we are no longer allowing gambling apps submitted by individual developers. The includes both real money gambling apps as well as apps that simulate a gambling experience.”
This latest removal follows a similar app removal in the Norwegian app store earlier this month in which several similar apps were removed after pressure from Norwegian regulators.
However, several apps which were not directly gambling related were also removed, prompting a flurry of complaints and tweets from affected developers.